For Just One Dance
by SETI-fan
Summary: At a social event for the mayor, Holtz takes a moment of sentimental nostalgia over her feelings for Abby.


**First time writing Holtz's POV. Hope it turned out okay! Also, while I'm totally onboard with the idea of Abby being aro/ace, I also feel she deserves to be appreciated as the gorgeous lady she is too. :)**

* * *

She blamed the wine. In reality, it was something she should have gotten out of her system a long time ago instead of fostering like a secret habit, but yeah, ultimately, the ethanol produced by fermented grapes sounded like a far better scapegoat for her emotional preoccupation that evening.

Years in academia had familiarized Holtzmann with the necessity of going to fancy social get-togethers put on by administrators to justify and show off how their patrons' grant money was being spent. So it was no surprise to her when the mayor sent a non-negotiable invite to the Ghostbusters for a year-end dinner party and conference with representatives of other government-funded institutions in the city. It was just one of the expectations scientists had in return for getting to play with other people's money.

While such events were far down Holtzmann's list of favorite ways to spend an evening, aside from the possibility of free food, she had to admit this one was going to be a lot more fun than most since it meant getting to see her teammates dressed to the nines for an evening. It wasn't often she got to see the three lovely women she was fortunate enough to call friends in anything fancier than their regular work attire and she planned to soak in every beautiful mental picture she could take.

Also, nowhere in the invite had it specified that she had to be wearing a dress. As much as Patty teased her in the days leading up to the party about whether she was planning to show up in her ghostbusting jumpsuit, Holtzmann actually had a few choice suits she had assembled and collected over the years for just such an occasion. Tonight she decided to break out Abby's favorite from their days at the Higgins Institute: a navy blue jacket and trousers with a glossy yellow dress shirt beneath that was a reasonable match for the lenses of her glasses. Abby loved it because it was University of Michigan's colors. While that hadn't been on Holtzmann's mind when she put it together, Abby's reaction had solidified it as a permanent addition to her wardrobe.

As Holtzmann came down the stairs at the firehouse where they'd changed before the party, she smugly heard Abby's excited response even before she reached the bottom step. "Yes! Your Wolverine suit!"

"Oh god, tell me she's not wearing spandex and claws," Patty groaned, turning around. "Holy…"

Holtz looked up from tugging her cuff into place when she realized it had gone oddly silent and saw Patty and Erin staring at her. Erin's jaw was hanging slack in what Holtzmann hoped was a good way.

A bit of self-consciousness crept into her mind, but she pushed it back with a smirking grin. "I take it I clean up okay, huh?"

"Okay? Baby, you are _fine_ in that suit!" Patty enthused. "Oh god, we've gotta go shopping together. I know some places you will flip over."

"Hey, Erin, like the colors?" Abby asked, nudging her out of her frozen state.

Erin nodded, swallowing a bit heavily. "Yeah, I, um, they're really something."

Any further comment was cut off as Kevin walked in in a suit a bit more hipster-ish than the formal event would suggest. He paused, doing a double-take when he saw Holtzmann. "Wait," he said, pointing her way. "Was I supposed to be wearing a dress?"

Holtzmann was distracted from her intrigue at Erin's reaction by the limits of how far she could push this new possibility. "Honestly, Kevin, didn't you get the memo? I think the mayor is going to be very offended if you don't."

"You wear whatever makes you feel good, Kev," Patty interrupted, giving Holtz a slightly stern look.

"Oh, okay. Well, guess I'll stick with this for now, but good to know for next time," he smiled, making Holtz grin wider with the potential of this new development.

The conversation continued on as they began filing out to the garage, but Holtzmann's attention was distracted abruptly when Abby squeezed her upper arm on the way down and said, "I'm glad you still have that outfit. You really do look awesome in it."

And then she was heading on to help Erin and Patty into the backseat of their new Ecto-3 and Holtz found herself frozen in place as a wave of the past rushed over her. The first time they had been forced to go to a luncheon at the Higgins Institute and agreed the free food would be worth more than the argument to get out of it. The expression on Abby's face when she saw Holtzmann in something other stained and burned lab clothes for the first time. The fire that had sparked in Holtz's belly, that someone she admired and adored as much as Abby could look at her that way…

"Holtzy, come on!" Patty's yell from the car derailed that train of thought. "Brainstorm later. Fashionably late is different than late-late and I don't want to miss any of that fancy rich people food."

So Holtzmann dragged her brain back into the present, swung herself moderately elegantly into the driver's seat, and tried not to spend too much of the drive looking in the rearview mirror or at the seat beside her lest the distraction of the beauty around her get them all killed.

Especially the seat beside her.

It was the memory rush of that last-minute touch and compliment, she concluded. Simple reactivation of a mental pathway that had been allowed to fade for the last few years, suddenly being reinforced with new stimuli. That was why, even once they got to the party and were introduced into a room filled with wealth and celebrity, with great minds, great wallets, elaborate decorations, and enough glitz to fill a dragon's horde (or at least a very determined magpie's), Holtzmann found her mind kept swirling through the cavalcade of potential distractions back to linger on the eternally enchanting Dr. Abigail Yates.

Fortunately, she didn't have to do much talking as the team socialized with various government officials. In fact, Holtz suspected the mayor and most of the members of her team were relieved she wasn't commenting as much as she normally would. Instead, after she made the initial jokes she could think of and it became clear none of the officials they met really wanted to know much about the engineering of their inventions so Erin and Abby could cover the majority of the diplomacy for the team while Patty and Kevin decided to sneak away to find the bar and hors d'oeuvres early, Holtzmann figured she could safely tune out most of the overstimulation of the crowd anyway.

She let her mind wander through ideas she had for the projects she had left half-finished in the lab, wondering how long the evening would last and what she would have time to do once they got home before her energy completely crashed for the night. When she ran out of ideas there, she tried to picture the wiring for the elaborate lighting system in the ballroom, how it fit behind the ornate architecture, and whether she could rig up a chandelier in the ample ceiling space of the firehouse. She tried thinking about anything and everything technological that typically flowed through her mind with very little conscious effort. But it was to no avail; no matter what, her mind kept drifting back to the woman who had been her first friend in the world, and who she had wished, in the quiet, hidden part of her heart, would have been more.

As if she could sense Holtz's mental state, though probably just noticing how quiet she was, Abby looked over from a conversation she and Erin were having with someone in an actual tuxedo and raised an eyebrow at Holtzmann. Holtz's heart warmed anew that Abby always made sure she was doing all right and began miming a talking gesture with her hand in sync to the tuxedo-man's long-winded conversation. Abby hid a snorted laugh and returned to paying attention to whatever he was saying.

Finally they were all seated at tables for dinner service and speeches. Holtzmann tuned in and out during the rambling, self-congratulatory platitudes and shout-outs to people she had no knowledge of, especially once it was made clear that whooping and shouting encouragement regardless was not appreciated. Her focus was drawn more to quietly enlisting Kevin in trying to identify the weird gourmet food they had been served, ultimately agreeing that it was some kind of bird stuffed with a non-bird meat, but they would need genetic analysis to narrow it down further. When the eating was done, but the speeches still dragged on, Holtz switched to doodling schematics on her napkin, pondering if her chandelier idea could have a ghost-trapping function built in, since one could never have too many booby-traps around.

She was jarred from her network of thoughts when Erin's elbow nudged her arm pointedly.

"They're talking about us," she whispered. "I think we should look like we're paying attention. Holtz, that's a cloth napkin!"

"I'm planning how to spend the next batch of grant money," Holtzmann protested quietly. "It's relevant!"

Patty leaned over, peering at her sketches. "You hang that over my desk and I'll store all your Pringles on the shelves I know you can't reach."

"Trust me, that doesn't work," Abby commented. "She'll just pile whatever's nearby to climb on until she can get to it. Including Kevin, probably."

"Probably what?" Kevin asked, the sound of his name tuning him back in from whatever had distracted him across the room.

"Nevermind, I think we're past looking like we're paying attention at this point," Erin muttered, sinking slightly in her chair as she reddened at the irritated glances from nearby tables.

"Hey, speaker's up there," Abby groused at one of the tables glaring down their noses at the team. "Judge him for a while and mind your business."

Holtzmann smiled to herself, loving her little chosen family all the more. The familiarity of how well Abby knew her from her prior comment stimulated the mental pathway again and she tried to focus her attention on the chandelier designs.

The evening improved dramatically when the speakers gave way to music and the guests were officially free to talk and mingle.

And drink. Patty put the mayor's money to good use again by ordering a very nice bottle of wine for their table.

"Patty, did you see the price on that brand?" Erin asked nervously.

"Hey, if the mayor's not down with giving us some free spirits, we could always threaten to free some spirits of our own, you know what I'm saying?" Patty snorted, breaking the seal on the bottle and pouring them each a glass.

Holtzmann usually didn't drink wine because it tended to make her sentimental and her impulse control wasn't great at the best of times, but she was out with her dearest friends, had already fulfilled her obligation to socialize for business purposes, and wasn't about to turn Patty down.

Rather than mingle and force interest in government projects again, the Ghostbusters made their own little party at their table, joking, telling stories, and encouraging Kevin to ask out the very cute waiter they realized had been the reason for his distraction earlier.

They had downed most of the bottle when the mayor's assistant—Jennifer, Holtz recalled slightly hazily—came over, resting her hands on the backs of Kevin's and Erin's chairs. "The mayor would appreciate it if you showed a bit more participation in the evening. He doesn't really want you talking to anyone, per se, but maybe if a couple of you joined in on the dancing…?" she said, glancing pointedly between Kevin and Erin.

Maybe it was the uncomfortable look on Kevin's face. Maybe it was the warm glow of the wine coursing through her. Maybe it was the fact that "I've Had the Time of My Life" started on the playlist right after Jennifer suggested that. Either way, Holtzmann found herself giving into a moment of impulse, standing, bowing slightly, and holding out a hand to Abby.

"Want to show 'em how it's done?"

The sparkle in Abby's eyes made the move instantly worth it. "Uh, _yeah_!"

"Oh lord," Patty groaned.

Jennifer's eyes had gone wide with alarm. "Maybe any _other_ combination instead?"

"Don't worry, we've got a whole routine for this one," Abby said, grabbing Holtz's hand as they hurried to the dance floor so they didn't miss their cues.

From the corner of her eye, Holtzmann saw Patty shake her head and caught a jealous look on Erin's face. Whether it was directed at her or Abby she planned to investigate later, but for this moment, her attention was entirely for Abby.

As they took up their starting position, left arms around each other's waists, Holtzmann's mind went back to their lab at Higgins again, when ghosts were still just theoretical and they had had long stakeouts and working nights to pass together. While Abby was usually happier to watch Holtzmann dance, Holtz could typically coax her to join in on over-the-top choreographed numbers when the mood was right.

For all her protesting, Abby was a lovely dance partner, willing to let Holtzmann lead and being game for her more ridiculous moves and attempts at rhythm, matching or one-upping them without self-consciousness. And, to Holtz's great relief when they were getting to know each other, she had never flinched away from Holtz's hand on her hip or seemed uncomfortable with the proximity of their bodies, despite knowing about Holtzmann's preferences since nearly day one.

The tempo of the music rose leading into the first chorus and Holtzmann extended their right arms, hands joined in a tango posture, and stared overly-intensely into Abby's eyes, making her own as wide as possible. Abby matched her with an excessively serious/snooty expression of her own and they began their strut across the dance floor.

Wine-warm and feeling an additional intoxication from Abby's perfume wafting around them, Holtz let the rhythm guide her movements and allowed herself to indulge by focusing her attention entirely on the dear, beautiful woman who had, for some reason, chosen to become her best friend.

She hadn't been exaggerating in her toast after the Battle of Time Square. Holtz had spent most of her life figuring that luxuries like family and friends were things that happened for other people, the tradeoff being her gifted comprehension of the more scientific wonders of the universe. Her mentorship with Dr. Gorin had led her to reevaluate whether those possibilities really had to be mutually exclusive and meeting Abby had blown the assumption completely to the land of rejected hypotheses. The idea anyone would like her for who she was after a lifetime of people implying this was too big a challenge to ask had rocked her to her core and opened a door in her heart she had been forced to close and try to ignore a very long time ago.

Abby had seen something worthy in her weirdness and Holtzmann had vowed every day since to live up to that faith and repay every bit of kindness Abby gave so freely.

Was it any surprise she had fallen in love almost instantly?

Holtz extended her arm, twirling Abby not-quite-smoothly as she didn't have much height advantage to work with. The swirl of Abby's skirt around her legs sparkled in a dazzling flourish, drawing Holtzmann's eyes before she let them drift back up to Abby's face, trying to keep her awe from showing through her expression, instead stepping back to shimmy somewhat arhythmically in the next sequence of their routine.

Of course she had fallen for Abby, Holtz mused as they started circling each other. Who wouldn't, once welcomed into the brilliant scientist's huge heart? Holtzmann had adored everything about her new friend and partner in science. She knew from the experience of her previous twenty-some years and work in multiple countries that the odds of finding a kindred spirit were infinitesimally small. Meeting Dr. Gorin had been immensely lucky. Having lightning strike twice with someone closer to her own age was a statistical anomaly and not to be taken for granted.

Learning through various comments and phrasings in their conversations that Abby didn't feel quite the same way back had been a painful blow. She had ultimately accepted it without ever letting Abby know the crossed wires had happened and carried on. It wasn't the first unrequited crush she had had and she suspected it wouldn't be the last. The crucial difference with this one was the realization that Abby did still undeniably love her and that romantic love was not the only kind out there, nor the only one that was important.

So Holtzmann returned her platonic love with all her heart and drove away any feelings that fell on the romantic side. She never, ever wanted Abby to feel uncomfortable around her for her own selfish reasons and gradually the longing faded and their bond was fulfilling in every way that mattered to her.

Until, apparently, a night of wine and nostalgia drew those feelings back from the depths of her soul.

Life was profoundly different now from how it had been when Holtz found herself in Abby's lab first looking for a job opportunity after a mistake destroyed her chances at CERN and left her drifting on her own. She had a job that challenged her and gave her freedom to build whatever she could imagine, a stable home with a lab beyond anything she could have hoped to expect, a whole lightning storm of family she had thought impossible, and, unless her instincts were completely off, a chance that maybe, with a bit more time, the feelings she was trying not to get her heart set on might be actually be returned by the endlessly intriguing Dr. Erin Gilbert.

A future lay before her with promise she couldn't have fathomed years before. She knew now she could let go of her lingering misplaced crush on Abby without the fear that she would never find anything even close again. But just now, for the length of one dance, she let her heart indulge itself one final time before putting it behind her once and for all.

So she marveled again at how Abby contained so much fire and determination and compassion in such a compact form, like a neutron star that powered their team's warp drive. She appreciated the sway of Abby's hips in the dress she had chosen that clung in just the right places, relished the soft curves under her hands that had become so comforting and familiar from years of hugs and casual touches. She let herself be hypnotized by the beauty of Abby's face, her eyes that could go from glittering with excitement to hardened with anger to soft with gentle concern, sometimes within a span of minutes. Her hair, rarely allowed to be loose and curled as it was tonight, framed her features that, at this moment, were especially radiant and slightly flushed with the energy of their dance and Holtz let herself wonder for one silent moment what Abby looked like in the tender moments after a passionate night, if the awe and affection Holtz saw in those blue eyes when demonstrating a particularly brilliant invention was the same as what she could inspire from physical pleasure.

But after a span that felt both endlessly eternal and disappointingly brief, the song began winding its way to its closing strains and Holtz found their movements slowing accordingly until she was standing across from Abby, just an arm's length away, her senses widening again as she returned to reality.

The music trailed out and they relaxed from their final poses, reminded of the rest of the room and its crowds when Patty's enthusiastic applause and whistles and Erin's slightly drunk whoop carried over the opening chords of the next song.

Abby laughed exhilaratedly, clapping Holtz's hands in an abbreviated version of their handshake. "Whoo! I think we've still got it, huh?" She grinned as she started heading back to the table. "That was fun!"

"Yeah," Holtz agreed, lowering her glasses back over her eyes as she mentally closed the door and left the past on the dance floor, following Abby toward their little family and the future of possibilities they represented. "It was."


End file.
